Pakistan Railways had retrieved as many as 544 acres precious land worth billion of rupees from the illegal occupants under its anti-encroachment operation across the country. “The encroachment operation was launched on the direction of Minister for Railways Khawaja Saad Rafique with the assistance of railway police and district administrations of the relevant province,” an official in the Ministry of Railways told APP. Giving details, he said, the department had retrieved 274 acres land in Punjab, 135 acres from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 109 acres from Sindh and 26 acres from Balochistan province.
The official said that out of the total retrieved land, 108 acres were commercial, 323 acres were residential and 113 acres were the agricultural land of the Pakistan Railways.
He said the government was taking several steps to retrieve encroached land from the land grabbers including detailed survey was being carried out to identify the encroached land, occupied by the individuals and under illegal occupation of various government departments.
The official said the campaign was being monitored by the Divisional Superintendents, Headquarters office and Ministry of Railways. The Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) and joint procedure orders had been issued since for strict implementation of this policy, the official added.
He said that First Information Reports (FIRs) were being lodged and cases were registered and sent to Pakistan Railways Judicial Magistrates for expeditious trial. The issue regarding illegal occupation and possession of Pakistan Railways land by government departments and institutions had also been taken up with the concerned departments, he added.
He said it was an ongoing campaign which would continue till the elimination and regularization of encroachments.
The official said Pakistan Railways owned 167,690 acres of land across the country, of which 90,326-acre is in Punjab, 39,428-acre in Sindh, 28,228-acre in Balochistan and 9,708-acre in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
